Four thugs who killed a friend of grime star Dizzee Rascal to ‘teach him a lesson’ were jailed for more than 60 years today.
Brenton Roper, who starred in a video for the rapper’s 2015 hit Nutcrackerz, was gunned down in daylight after he confronted a dealer selling drugs near his home.
He tried to run away from his killers before being stabbed five times in the backside and thigh.
Brenton Roper, who starred in a video for the rapper’s 2015 hit Nutcrackerz, was gunned down in daylight after he confronted a dealer selling drugs near his home.
Brenton Roper with friend Dizzee Rascal in the Nutcrackerz video
Mr Roper, 41, bled to death despite the efforts of members of public to give him first aid until paramedics arrived.
He was targeted after arguing with dealer Foyzur Rahman, 28, about the sale of drugs outside his home in Bow, east London, at around 4pm on May 13 last year.
Rahman was sitting in his Audi with Shah Rahman, 28, and Mohammed Shaid, 27, when he threatened to shoot Mr Roper.
Shortly after driving away from the scene, Shaid and Shah Rahman returned in Shaid’s Volkswagen Golf armed with a gun and a knife.
Shaid admitted firing the fatal shot and taking the blade from Shah to inflict the additional wounds.
Rahman and his friend Monzur Ahmed, 27, then helped the pair to escape.
Shaid was convicted of the ‘shockingly violent’ murder earlier this month while the other three were found guilty of manslaughter.
Convicted: Gunman Mohammed Shaid was found guilty of murder and jailed for life with a minimum term of 30 years
Judge Philip Katz QC jailed gunman Shaid for life with a minimum term of 30 years and passed determinate sentences ranging between nine and 12 years for his accomplices on the basis he could not be sure they knew of the weapons in advance.
‘Brenton Roper was 41 in May of last year when he was stabbed and shot in broad daylight virtually on his own doorstep in a residential street in Bow,’ he said.
‘He was a much-loved father, son, partner and brother.
‘His entire family has been devastated by his sudden and brutal death.
Shah Rahman, of Longbridge Road, Dagenham, east London, was jailed for 12 years
‘Members of his family who sat with quiet dignity throughout these proceedings listened on as each of you has attempted to deny responsibility for your actions.’
The judge said that Mr Roper’s known use of Spice was seized upon and ‘used rather cynically in this trial to construct at least one entirely false defence.’
‘I am sure that it was his hostility to drug dealing which led to Brendon Roper’s death rather than any drugs turf war,’ he continued.
To Foyzur Rahman he added: ‘I am sure that you and the others decided that Brenton Roper had to be taught a lesson.’
Relatives of Mr Roper sat in the well of the court throughout his killers’ trial and returned to see the thugs jailed.
In a victim impact statement, Mr Roper’s sister, Jaime, said on behalf of her family: ‘It really is not an easy thing to try to put into words and then onto paper how we are all feeling.
‘Words like sad, angry, cheated, loss, horror and frightened, give you some idea.’
Dealer: Foyzur Rahman, of Beveridge Mews, Stepney Green, was jailed for 10 years after assisting the escape
She added that they still live in the area Mr Roper was killed and described how neighbours still stopped them in the street ‘to talk to us and cry with us’ about it.
His ‘broken-hearted’ fiancée, Mandy Bourne, spoke of feeling ‘numb’ at her loss while Mr Roper’s teenage daughter, Cortny Roper, reflected on how when she ‘needed him the most he could not be there because he was taken from us’.
The court heard Mr Roper was a popular figure in his local area and was known to dislike drug dealers because of his sister’s problems with addiction.
Accomplice: Monzur Ahmed, 27, helped his friends to escape and was failed for nine years
He had told a nearby garage owner: ‘They think they can lick a shot [deal drugs] in my street and I can’t stand it.’
CCTV captured Mr Roper confronting Foyzur Rahman, who was sitting in the driver’s seat of a black Audi parked in the road where Mr Roper lived with his partner and their children.
Rahman threatened to shoot Mr Roper before driving off.
Less than half an hour later Sahah Rahman and Shaid made their way to the same street armed with a knife and a gun and wearing hoods over their heads.
They parked their VW Golf close by, as did Rahman in his Audi, giving the killers two potential getaway vehicles.
Prosecutor Oliver Glasgow QC said: ‘Mr Roper was chased along the road by two men who shot him in the back and stabbed him several times.
‘Whilst he lay bleeding to death his two attackers fled the scene on foot.’
Mr Roper was hit in the back by a single bullet which passed through the right lung and the right ventricle of the heart and suffered five stab wounds to his left-hand side and left leg.
Brenton Roper, 41, who was killed ‘virtually on his doorstep’ after confronting a drug dealer
After the killing, Foyzur Rahman and Ahmed helped the pair to escape and met up with them at a flat in Leamouth Peninsula.
The next day Shah Rahman, with his family’s help, and Shaid, who had been due to get married before the murder, flew to Bangladesh before returning to the UK on 20 May when they assumed it was safe.
‘Even when you knew Brenton Roper had died it does not seem to have occurred to any of you to do the right thing,’ Judge Katz told the killers, adding he had seen ‘no remorse from any of you whatsoever’ until they were convicted.
Shaid, Foyzur Rahman and Monzur Ahmed were arrested on 24 June but made no comment in police interview.
Shah Rahman was eventually arrested in Brighton on 6 September 2016.
Mr Glasgow said: ‘No matter what may have been said or done by Brenton Roper to offend Foyzur Rahman, there is nothing that any of the four defendants can say to excuse the threat to kill Brenton Roper and the subsequent murderous attack upon him.’
Shaid, of Arrow Road, Bow, was jailed for life with a minimum term of 30 years.
Ahmed, of Whitethorn Street, Bow, was jailed for nine years.
Foyzur Rahman, of Beveridge Mews, Stepney Green, was jailed for 10 years.
Shah Rahman, of Longbridge Road, Dagenham, east London, was jailed for 12 years.
The latter three will serve half their sentences in custody and the remainder on licence.